Mistake one. Asking a Walmart employee a question.
Mistake two. Expecting a rational answer from said Walmart employee.

I've long since given up on one of my local Wal-Marts, and I have been referring to it as "The Land of Jerjerrod" for at least two years, since they've had a (very slowly declining) stock of 2006 TSC Jejerrods (currently 8 and counting!) for the past 4 years.  What makes it worse is we have a Hasbro rep in my area who will routinely come and clear the pegs of older figures, and the WM toy department manager just busts open the "RETURN FOR CREDIT" boxes and restocks the pegs with them.  So, if you're looking for any of those "recalled" Ugnaughts, Needas, Brainiacs, and Yarnas (along with 8 Jerjerrods!), I can tell you exactly where to find them. 

This particular WM is also horrible about resets.  They didn't get the GI Joe movie toys until a month after the movie had opened (at which point everyone had already gotten all they wanted), and aside from the new Iron Man movie toys, they've had the exact same stock in the action figure aisle for the last 8 months.  A trickle of things sell, but they're never restocked.  Strangely, every Wal-Mart I've been into in the last 8 months looks like K-Marts usually look (i.e. someone's earlier analogy to a t-shirt gun being used to stock the shelves).  This from the company that claimed they were going to be the Number 1 toy retailer and drive Toys R Us out of business?  Yikes.

And to keep my post on topic, I bought the AT-AT at Toys R Us yesterday and, boy, is it a monster.

Picked up the Anti-Hailfire Droid Squad and Clones and Droids Battle Packs from Target, along with the three Wave 1 deluxe sets (Anakin/Star Skiff, Bane/Pirate Speeder, and Plo/Speeder Bike) from TRU.com. 

Also grabbed the Saga Legends Battle Droid set from TRU earlier in the week (and was amazed that they are actually the Geonosis Arena SA versions from last fall and not the goofy 2002 Saga molds I was expecting Hasbro to cheap out with).  They even included two stands!

The local Target has been resetting the action figure aisle over the last week, and put out 2 cases of Wave 1 earlier this week.  I picked up Cobra Commander, Snow Job, Beach Head, Alley Viper, and Firefly, and two days later when I went back, all that was left were the multiple Dukes, Snake Eyes, and Storm Shadows. 

I have to say that I was beyond impressed with Snow Job.  I don't think I recall a figure coming with this many accessories at this price point, especially one from Hasbro; the only one that is comparable is the ROC Pit Trooper, although I'd say Snow Job beats him in how all his accessories can be packed on the figure itself.  I mean, he comes with a frigging frying pan!  This is, all in all, probably the best Joe figure I've gotten since the RAH days back in the 80's, and definitely the most fun figure this year.  The other figures are nice, but Snow Job is the winner, hands-down.

My only complaint is with Beach Head, mainly when it comes to his weaponry.  All the other figures have the ability to carry/pack their weapons (Firefly's backpack even holds his extra head), but Beach's plethora of guns have nowhere to go; not even a holster for the pistol.  Plus, and maybe I just got a bad one, the knife sheath on his back doesn't even have a knife that goes in it, making it a little useless.  Even though he's sculpted well, and has more accessories than you can shake a stick at, I can't help but feel a little disappointed that he doesn't have a backpack or anything to carry all of it around with him.

I wonder if that new "marquee" area that they have in most stores that has recently featured Iron Man 2, Bakugan and Toy Story 3 is going to be used to feature the new Star Wars stuff in a couple of weeks.

From what I've seen, Pete, that section is going to be used for the new Transformers stuff that's coming out at the end of this month (and that has been out at TRU for the past several weeks).  My Target was in the midst of doing a huge reset of the entire toy department and the only lines that still had dedicated space at the moment were Iron Man, Marvel Universe, DC Universe, and Toy Story.  One entire side of the aisle had been cleared and had the "Something New is Coming Soon" signage on the wall, so I'd assume this is where the fall Hasbro onslaught of SW, GIJ:POC, and the regular TF section are going to wind up.

Just wanted to (at least locally) confirm the "expansion" of Target's MU section to 4 pegs.  Walked in this morning to find them FILLED with two cases' worth of the wave 8 "variant" case.  Got a Kitty, Colossus, "Death" Archangel, and Classic Havok for myself; by the time I went back later to pick up a Juggy and an AIM Soldier for some friends, all the Havoks, Kittys, and Deaths were gone.  The odd part was that they didn't have the original "winged" Archangel and the original Havok; hopefully those will show up in a revision case at some point in the near future.

The thing that sucks about the Classic Havok is that his headpiece is a separate piece attached to the center of his head (on front and back) by tiny pegs, and Hasbro's tight-as-crap packaging causes it to warp, which leads to it inevitably flopping to the side of his head upon removing him from the package.  Clones being unable to hold their guns is annoying enough, but to have a figure's head not look right?  Unacceptable.  I shouldn't have to superglue a figure together within seconds of opening it.

Also picked up the variant head Jim Lee Wolverine earlier in the week at a comic shop for only slightly above regular retail (this comic shop doesn't resell and orders directly from Diamond, so I didn't feel bad about it).  Definitely improves the figure overall by a longshot. 

It's sounding like a broken record (in a good way), but I got this from TRU.com late in the week, and it's just pretty damned near perfect.  The inclusion of the alternate firing guns (both front and back) was a very nice gesture from Hasbro, especially with how little things like this tend to get dropped due to costing issues on a lot of other items.  Both Luke and Dack fit perfectly in the cockpit (and their hands fit the controls!), the little spot for Luke's harpoon gun is a great touch, and I can't get over just how nice this thing looks.  This is a 10/10 all around for Hasbro, and I really hope they do a "red" repaint for Wedge somewhere down the line.

(I'm in the midst of trying to translate the Aurabesh inscription on the side of the ship and will update this post once I have it finished)

Picked up the first wave of Generations deluxes earlier this week at my TRU, and they're, overall, pretty nice.  My only gripe is with the WFC Bumblebee, as he is extremely difficult to get to stay together in vehicle mode; the panels don't line up exactly with one another, and there are frequently "gaps" in the body where the panels meet.  He's great in robot mode, though; however, as I only have access to a Wii, I will never play the game, so I will also never know how accurate he and Prime are.

So, does anyone know if Hasbro is going to rerelease Classics Thundercracker now that they've confirmed Dirge as an eventual Generations deluxe release?  It'd be nice to have all 6 Seekers, but I didn't know if the Botcon folks still had dibs on Thundercracker in the US.

Also, how nice that Hasbro is giving us a repaint of HA Sideswipe, yet still can't get Mudflap back into the assortment.